this, and, for my part, I should at the last like to be
disposed of as a savage.
There is no such thing as absolute independence. You must ask for bread when you come into the world, and will ask for water when about to leave it. Freedom of body is equally a myth, and a dema gogue s text ; though freedom of mind is a certainty, and within the reach of all, grand duke or galley- slave, peasant or prince.
Since we are always more or less dependent, a wise and just man will seek to make the load as light as possible on his fellows. Socrates disliked to trouble even so humble and coarse a person as his jailer. Mahomet mended his own clothes, and Confucius waited on himself till too feeble to lift a hand.
If these wise men were careful not to take the time of others to themselves, when living and capable of doing or saying something for the good of their fellows in return, how much more careful we should be not to do so when dead when we can help no thing whatever, and nothing whatever can help or harm us !
Holding this, I earnestly desire that my body shall be burned, as soon as the breath has left it, in the sheets in which I die, without any delay, ceremony, or preparation, beyond the building of a fire. There shall be no tomb or inscription of any kind. If a man does any great good, history will take note of it. If he has true friends, he will live in their hearts while they live, and that is cer-
